I have the same thing from my cell phone ringing (not physical discomfort, but my senses perk up if I hear the slightest sound that resembles my cell phone ringer in the background).

To wake up, tell yourself before you go to sleep that when your alarm goes off, you will get up. When your alarm goes off, stand up with both feet squarely on the floor and wait for your head to clear. Remember, waking up and turning off your alarm is something that you can control because it literally is all in your head.

If you are actually sleeping through your alarms, then set multiples. But remember to tell yourself to actually wake up when the alarm goes off. And this is the important part: actually mean it when you say it.

I'm not sleeping through alarms. They just aren't waking me up on a conscious level. If I toss my phone in a random place before I go to bed, it'll ring, and I'll find it.

...

and then I'll go to bed.

And sleeping 10-12 hours still doesn't result in me wanting to get out of bed.

When this sort of thing happens, the alarm clocks need to be set away from the bed so you have to get up to turn them off. It sucks, but at least you'll get up in time.

Who needs an alarm clock when you don't sleep? Seriously I've been know not to sleep for about 2 days, crash for 8 hours and then repeat, no alarm clock needed, mostly only do that during school though.

When I do need to wake up though I usually set my iPhone to some random ungodly sound that scares me awake.

Have you tried one of those alarm clocks for deaf people, that physically shakes your head when it is time to get up?

IMHO, this is a serious part of it. For me, I dream basically every night and often I'm seeing people that I don't get to see in real life anymore. I don't want to leave that world in the morning and I have a hard time forcing myself to. Conversely, when those people were in my life, it was much easier to get up knowing I would see them. At one time I got so used to it I would wake up automatically on time and turn off my alarm before it had a chance to go off.

This is irrelevant. I have my alarm on the other side of my room. I need to get up to turn it off. And I usually do so in an insomniac state where I'm thinking of which combination of UNIX commands will shut the goddamn thing off. And my alarm is an ordinary clock radio.

This is something I never do anymore because I can't shut my brain off and don't like what I'm stuck thinking about anymore. During the day, I distract myself with computers, cars, music, and occasionally a basketball. During the night, there's nothing to distract me anymore. So I avoid going to bed as long as I possibly can. It really doesn't feel good, but I guess it still feels better than thinking about it that much more...

That would probably work for me as well. I'm not comfortable without covers. Which is a problem when the room is too hot...

The radio would never wake me up. I never even bother with it. Usually when I'm visiting my brother, he'll turn on his entertainment center crazy loud in the same room as me with rap music blazing and I can sleep through it no problem (unless I'm hung over... ). Music won't wake me. And radio DJs would probably just entertain me. Both would find their way into my dream.

The Wendy's fast food joint where my colleagues and I go for lunch once or twice per week has the exact same alarm as me and it drives me crazy... And it's right on the other side of the counter so customers are bothered by it too... It is not a pleasant sound (it makes you want to kill things) so I wouldn't be surprised if enough people complained for them to get rid of it because I don't remember hearing it in a few weeks.

Yeah, this happens to me too. Often many times in a morning if nothing stops me. There have been times when I've dreamed the whole day had gone by (and believed it completely) and then I wake up only to realize that I haven't even woken up yet...

I don't have a problem thinking. My brain never seems to go into power saving mode... It's hard to let my conscious mind give in. Even when I'm asleep I'm dreaming and often have lucid dreams. In the morning, my brain is doing a lot of thinking, but unfortunately all it's capable of doing is this kind of thinking:

{"name":"insomnia.png","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/8\/b\/8bfeaf343ab5eae80e79455bad64387c.png","w":740,"h":237,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/8\/b\/8bfeaf343ab5eae80e79455bad64387c"}^[1]

The things that motivate me are gone and my hands are tied.

This would work well, but unfortunately in the time it took my head to clear everybody else would be awake and furious... If I was living alone I would do this^[2].

Again, this goes back to the motivation argument. If there's something to look forward to then you'll have a much easier time getting up. The problem is that the world doesn't necessarily have to cooperate.

I don't really like the taste of coffee. I also don't like the idea of it. It seems to make everybody a mindless zombie and I like my mind...

This is my main problem. I dream regularly and love to sleep, but I have a hard time getting there. My mind is very active and I can't just shut it down... So I lie in bed thinking about things and it keeps me awake. And lately all I have to think about are bad things so I don't even like to go to bed knowing I'll be up for hours thinking about it. So I postpone even getting to that step. By the time morning comes, I've had at most 6 hours of sleep and I'm still exhausted so I don't want to get up.

What I usually do is set my alarm an hour early. I set it for 7 and then when that goes off I set it for a more correct time when I have to wake up, which is anywhere from 7:30 to 8:00, depending on how close to or over the wire I'm willing to be for the sleep. The hardest part is trying to figure out how to set my alarm while in an insomniac state... Like I said, everything in my life/dreams merge together to form an incomprehensible puzzle and my brain simply can't solve it. I'll be lying there thinking of all kinds of crazy things trying to figure it out and I just can't... I've been trying to figure out which vim command will do what I need...

You need a serious heart-to-heart talk with the man in the mirror as to why you're pushing yourself so hard. What do you hope to accomplish?

My mind just kind of wanders, despite my best efforts to not think of anything.

And we gladly bow down to our Supreme Loser overlord

As soon as you wake up, put on some shorts, go outside, and jog / walk for an hour. If you cannot do that, then go find some corner to curl up and die in.

Blood prefers carbon monoxide (CO) not dioxide.

No, the problem is that you are a complete loser if you cannot get out of bed. An alarm clock will in no way change that.

I always wake up before the alarm rings and I switch it off (and it's always within my arm's reach), then I just lie in bed for 5-10 minutes to clear my head and I get up. I never had any problems with it.